Witoubou Newmai
The Meghalaya Peoples Human Rights Council (MPHRC) has attributed the rise of rape cases in Meghalaya to ‘failures of the justice system’.
It is very much likely that this argument of the MPHRC holds good even if we discuss about the issue on the premise of the country.
In India, rape has become one of the most common crimes.
According to a news item appeared in The Times of India on June 11 this year, of the 3.38 lakh crime cases against women in 2016, rape cases made up 11.5% of them. “But with only 1 in 4 rape cases ending up in conviction, it’s a painfully slow road to justice for rape victims in the country”, the report said.
This report, very much, reflects the argument of the Meghalaya based human rights body.
We need also to note that there have been reports in the media for a long time now that many rape incidents go unreported in India.
According to a report in Los Angeles Times, there was a 12% rise in rape-related cases in 2016 in part in India because women felt more emboldened to report crimes.
The same report also said that the national statistics remain shocking. “In 40% of the rape cases, the victims were under 18. Courts move so slowly that one children’s rights organization estimated that if no new child sexual abuse cases were brought after 2016, it still would take India’s justice system 20 years to conclude pending trials”, Los Angeles Times further reported.
On November 27, 2019, while celebrating the 23rd foundation day of the human rights body, Dino Dympep, chairman of the Meghalaya Peoples Human Rights Council said that nearly six years after the government amended laws and put in place new guidelines and policies aimed at justice for survivors of rape and sexual violence, women and girls continue to face barriers to reporting such crimes in that state. “Victim-blaming is rampant, and lack of witness and victim protection laws makes girls and women from marginalized sections of people even more vulnerable to harassment and threats”, Dino Dympep added.
Taking note of this comment of Dino Dympep is very important, which can be extrapolated and made it to relate with several premises.
Given the scenario, concerned organizations and authorities need to create “justice and accountability mechanisms” effectively as a part of the measure to address the rising cases of rape. Mechanisms acting as deterrence are yet to be “loud and pronounced”, and the problem is that we are not talking about this so far.
